Karma—What Goes Around Comes Around?

There is no evidence that karma, fate, and destiny affect human lives.

I recently won an academic prize, and one of the journalists I talked to was keen to attribute my winning to karma, because I had previously arranged for the nomination of another winner. The idea of karma originated in Indian religions such as Hinduism and Buddhism, but is also used in the West to mean that good deeds will be rewarded with good results, with the opposite for bad deeds. This assumption is captured in the popular saying “What goes around comes around” and in the much older proverb “As you sow, so shall you reap.”

The idea of karma is different from the view that what happens is the result of fate, destiny, or what is “meant to be.” Karma allows room for free will: You make a choice and then benefit or suffer as the result of your choice. In contrast, fate and destiny do not allow room for free will. But like fate and destiny, the idea of karma is not based on any good evidence.

What would it take to show that karma actually exists? We would need to consider a large sample of human behavior, and look to see whether there is a substantial correlation between people doing good things and having good things happen to them later, and between people doing bad things and having bad things happen to them later. Of course, the study would also need to consider cases where good deeds and bad deeds are not followed by commensurate results. To my knowledge, no one has ever conducted such an investigation. The plausibility of karma is based on a few anecdotes and on the general appeal of the idea that people will get what they deserve. In the background is the religious idea that cosmic reciprocity is ensured by divine actions, with a god or gods ensuring that people really do get what they deserve. This idea is no more plausible than the formerly widespread belief that the good will of the gods can be achieved by sacrificing animals. Reciprocity—treating people well because they have treated you well—is an important part of human interactions, but the cosmos plays no part in it. The original Buddhist idea of karma based on reincarnation is even more problematic with respect to evidence.

Independent of the problem of finding evidence for divine reciprocity, we can certainly consider counterexamples to the claim that what goes around comes around. In history, there have been legions of people who have done good deeds for their families and other people while still living lives of quiet desperation. At the other end, there are despotic leaders like Stalin and predatory criminals like Jack the Ripper who got to the end of their lives without any particularly dire consequences. These examples do not prove that there is no such thing as karma, but should combine with the lack of evidence for karma to support the conclusion that karma is just a myth. The belief that what goes around comes around is just wishful thinking.

Similarly, there is no evidence that supports ideas about fate, destiny, and some things being meant to be, or not meant to be. In my most widely viewed blog post, I raised the question: Does everything happen for a reason? I argued that the view that everything happens for a reason is implausible because events sometimes occur by chance or by accident. Like karma, fate, and destiny, the view that everything happens for a reason merely serves to provide false assurance to people suffering through a difficult world. People would be better off to use evidence-based reasoning to figure out how to deal with unavoidable uncertainty, without mythology.

The Western concept of Buddhist Karma was twisted into the idea of "what goes around comes around". Karma is not meant to be a punishment (nor a reward really). It's a personal lesson. It's not a Savings account you add good deeds to. If you're doing good deeds for a particular end or reward, are they really good deeds or are they selfish deeds? You do what you do and if what you're doing/saying/thinking causes harm, then Karma is the lesson that repeats until you learn differently, in this lifetime or the next. And scientifically speaking, why not reincarnation? We are the stuff of stars after all...does not our energy get recycled eventually?

The Hindu/Buddhist notion of Karma is more similar to Jesus' Golden Rule, "Do unto others what you would have them do unto you." Because Karma is the notion of the Self's closed system. We are all closed systems wherein what we do is done to us, is by our own will. There is no such thing as that which is outside of our own perception.

When we are cruel to others, for example, we are cruelty personified. As we are cruel in our way of being it is our own cruelty that is personified and reflected back onto ourselves. So you cannot DO something to another that you aren't also doing unto yourself.

Just try this: When you are in a line waiting to be serviced, get annoyed with those who hold up the line and notice this annoyance is projected back into your own psyche. Next use patience with those who are holding things up and notice you experience patience within yourself.

When you smile at another, you are not giving a smile but causing a reflection of the smile. Try to smile because that is who you wish to be, not because that is what you wish others to be. By doing so you become that which you wish to see of the world.

Broadly mis-conveyed, the crux of Christianity is the example of Jesus Christ who members of the human beings are called to imitate by being "Other Christs". And Jesus' example was, a lifetime of doing good, and then unimaginable suffering, failure, and utter loss and repudiation by his peers and virtually all the people he ministered to, on the Cross, with other declared criminals. But the message still is: "he who loses all, wins", for Jesus resurrected and appeared per the Bible to the apostles with a glorified body, albeit with wounds. Bottom line: suffering is part of the program; transformation is all that matters-- and if suffering will "kick you into the kingdom of heaven" (as Echart Tolles says), then suffering is "good". But the "Fall" of Adam and Eve was that they ate of the fruit of "Good and Evil"--they acquired the Blinders of "Dualistic consciousness" or "maya" as the Hindus call it, whereas before
"the Fall" they could see the Oneness of reality and were the happier for it. So Christ says, "carry your cross and follow me" and you "will have life and life more abundantly" -- all paradoxical statements, because he is inviting us to go beyond the perspective offered by the fruit of the "Tree of Good and Evil"-in other word the dualistic, non-redeemed, un-enlightened mindset of the great bulk of humanity. Evolution is prompting us to go to this higher "Christ Consciousness" (of course there are other words for this, or rather, inadequate "pointers" to the reality that cannot be named let alone "empirically" proven or disproven by mere "data."

Anon,
I like some of your well-studied interpretations - I would expand, however, on "Bottom line: suffering is part of the program; transformation is all that matters" by saying, suffering is not necessary.

The only reason it's a matter of the bible's concern at all is that in the time it was written, there was more suffering than humanly imaginable. There was a time in human history when the world was an awful place to be in. We are not in that time and have reduced the suffering to a minimum, in this country at least. There was a time when it was really important to communicate ways to transform above human suffering. This is why those who transformed went through amazing feats of suffering, in order to prove that life lived as if there is no suffering is a life that is transformed.

Dear Sandra, you bring up interesting issues: Is suffering absolutely necessary for enlightenment or "salvation"? and Is modern "suffering" comparable at all to suffering of the ancient peoples? I think the founders of what would later be called Buddhism and Christianity defined human "suffering" in a way that transcended culture and centuries. For eg., Buddha taught as his first "noble truth that, "To live means to suffer" because the human nature is not perfect and neither is the world we live in. During our lifetime, we inevitably have to endure physical suffering and psychological suffering like sadness, fear, frustration, disappointment, and depression, and suffering lies in "clinging" or "the five aggregates of clinging": clinging to physical form (including the body), feelings, perceptions, thought constructs, and object-consciousness. However, when the five aggregates are free from clinging, he tells us, they lead to long-term benefit and happiness. Hence, Buddha would answer, "Modern humans still cling, so they still suffer." Similarly, Jesus might say, "all human beings are still deeply wounded" psycho-spiritually. As Father Thomas Keating explains, virtually every modern human child as he grows comes to identify "happiness for which it's innately programmed" with a) the gratification of emotional programs (developed to try to cope, pre-rationally, with deprivations of varying degrees of one or all of the our instinctual needs for survival/security, affection/esteem/approval, and power/control) and b) with the sense of belonging to a group. However, in time these programs fail to fulfill outlandish "childish" pre-rational desires for security, esteem, and control, thereby causing rejection and frustration, more pain, the need to alleviate the pain (as by some behavior or substance (ie., addictions develop), afflictive emotions go off when the symbols/surrogates for the instinctual needs are not forthcoming (anger, envy, fear(lack of faith/trust),other cardinal "sins"). And sin (hamartia] means, as an archer, "to miss the mark". We are looking for happiness in the wrong places, our emotional programs gives us an irresistable "craving" to gratify the pre-rational "needs" in the wrong places by the wrong means, and even if we knew where happiness lies (ie., in complete surrender of will to a Higher Power (God of your understanding), we seem to be "wounded" in our ability to do that. All this is called traditionally by Christians "original sin", and, again, there is no reason to expect it is any less present now than in ancient times. Of course, full fledge, complete involvement in a good religious spiritual practice should lessen any absolute "necessity" of suffering having to "kick us into the kingdom of heaven" in this world--but rarely do we humans engage in such a "perfect involvement" or discover early enough what are "good spiritual practices and teachings" nor do we do it so regularly that "suffering becomes unnecessary". Rather the flesh-"false self" or "unobserved egoic mind-self" runs the show until enough suffering causes us to want to discover our "true self", to awaken the "imageo deo" within the hard block of false self stone. Chipping away at this (or allowing God or the "not-God" Godhead to do it) is painful. It involves complete detachment to bring about this breakthrough into the desert of the Godhead. Actually, for us Americans letting go" of all things inside and outside of us (non-attachment) may be harder since we Americans are probably more attached to things and to immediate gratification of our perceived needs and desires with objects. Space and stillness and silence wherein this Higher Power especially dwells and speaks tends to be foreign territory to us.

The idea of karma is not based on any good evidence. What would it take to show that karma actually exists and the idea of karma originated in Indian religions such as Hinduism and Buddhism?

Many people ask how the first karma was bound. Did the body come before the karma? Did the chicken come before egg? It is all the same. In reality, there is no such thing as the first karma in the world. Karma and Soul have existed throughout time without a beginning or an end. Karmas are charged atoms. The Soul is the living or conscious element. Both Soul and matter are always separate. A element is an eternal element. There is no beginning to that which is eternal. All karmas are charged because of the union of the living and non-living. It is the seed karma (cause or charge karma), which gives the fruit of karma (effect or discharge karma) in the next life. Karmas produce circumstances that by nature are temporary. Union is followed by separation. Circumstances come and go, giving rise to various stages of existence and events. When the wrong belief, “I am this and this is mine,” arises it results in the visible and tangible worldly life. If one understands this mystery then there is only the Pure Soul and circumstance.Owing to the lack of such understanding we use the gross language of fortune, fate, or destiny, etc. The science however tells us this much, that if we remain separate from the evidences, then we can stay in the Pure Soul and only then,karma does not exist.

Hello everyone Am a true believer of karma.I would like to share what is said about karma in Bhagwat gita,kim karma kim akarmeti, kavayo ‘py atra mohitaah “Even the intelligent are bewildered in determining what is action and what is inaction.” (Bhagavad Gita 4.16)

i red this in http://devotionalnectar.com/self-improvement/radhanath-swami-speaks-of-the-principles-of-karma/

As for answering the question whether suffering is needed for enlightenment, I believe suffering is not needed, technically, for enlightenment. However, suffering experienced directly or indirectly (e.g. witnessing suffering of others or loved ones) by an individual often poses as a motivator for the individual to seek peace or reward in terms that cannot be enumerated in material terms.

When we speak of karma, we must think in the same "currency" when pairing up an initial action with its subsequent results. If the initial action is material and concrete, rather than being celestrial or ecclesiastical, the ensuing consequence must be accounted for in the same terms. To say someone who has been kind all his or her life but later on get gunned down by a unrelated drive-by gang shooting or die shortly after as a result of excruciating terminal diseases but assummably gone to heaven is not evidence-based. Also, to use argument like one will see better life in his/her next life or one whose decendants will enjoy better life as a result of good deeds done by their ancestors will equate to cherry-picking the experimental results that agree with a theory from a ocean of ones that do not.

Every object in this universe, including all souls, and all humans are simultaneously and continuously interactive. This interaction is also continuously changing with time. Nobody is alone or isolated. Nobody can do anything without the active participation of many other activities. This simultaneous interaction is global over space and time. What is happening here and now is the result of what happened there and everywhere form infinite past to the present day and moment.

Therefore it is impossible to analyze karma and destiny without reincarnations and past life activities of all people involved.

Most importantly destiny is the correct thing and karma is wrong. Karma is wrong only if you think karma means you have freewill. There is no freewill it is all destiny, moment by moment our actions are all defined. Karma is correct if you only think it is just work assigned to you by your destiny.

Look at your statements - what you sow is what you reap. Isn't it destiny. It means past is controlling present. You also say cause and effect - isn't it also destiny. Cause happens before the effect. So, again past is controlling the present. Any time time you take any action, there is a reason for it. Your reasons happened before you acted - again past is controlling the present.

Thus destiny is correct thing. But note that the last paragraph did not consider the simultaneity law. If you consider the effect of all persons then you will not be able to see the reasons for you result. Because you did not produce the result; everybody together did.

So, destiny is correct, and therefore there is no good and bad in nature. An apple is good and an orange is bad is meaningless. Similarly Mr.X is good and Mr.Y is bad is meaning less also. Therefore there is no good karma or bad karma. Everything is planned and destiny.

For more details please look at the book on Soul Theory at https://theoryofsouls.wordpress.com/

Nice article but Its far from actual budhdhist concept of karma.Original Buddhist teaching is rather very scientific atleast from a psychological perspective.It goes with modern CBT concepts about how our thoughts,feelings and behaviour is connected.So it says that everything is connected in the world and our lives and we have to face consequences of choices/actions.Actions/deeds with evil thoughts will bring suffering and those done with pure mind will not bring suffering.

In this article, the author misrepresents karma. It is not the same as "you reap the benefits of what you sow". The "you" in Indian philosophy from where Buddhism and Hinduism as religions derive themselves from is not that simple to explain. In fact, there's no "you", "me", "them" according to their philosophy. All of it is one. A single consciousness. So when you go harm an animal for instance, you are also harming youself. This universal consciousness can be considered like a closed energy system. You can negate energy from one entity, add to another, transfer and lose some. But net will be the same. It is an oversimplification but for a comment I do not know how else to frame it.